During processing of a substrate, a process chamber is exposed to process gases, for example such as in a etch or deposition process. As a result of such processing, contaminants, such as those formed from the interaction of the process gases and the substrate, deposit on the walls of the chamber as well as on other chamber components. Accordingly, a cleaning process is performed at desired intervals to remove these contaminants from the process chamber. Unfortunately, the inventor has discovered that the pressure gauge often fails after such a cleaning process. The inventor has discovered that, although the cleaning agents are removed from the process chamber after the cleaning process, there is residual moisture remaining in the process chamber that can corrode the pressure gauge—even though the pressure gauge is isolated during the cleaning process itself. The inventor has also discovered similar pressure gauge failures at other times when the chamber is opened, such as for part replacement, inspection, or the like. Thus, the inventor believes that residual moisture not completely removed from the process chamber (for example from the cleaning process or from exposing the chamber to air) is interacting with byproducts deposited in the tube that couples the pressure gauge to the process chamber upon opening the tube to expose the pressure gauge to the process chamber, leading to corrosion and failure of the pressure gauge.
Accordingly, the inventor has provided methods for limiting damage to a pressure gauge coupled to a process chamber resultant from cleaning the process chamber.